Penguin Eggs

Now settled for the long haul in Nashville, ex-Vancouverite Steve Dawson is both smack dab in the heart of the industry beast and the region he’s been immersed in for a good chunk of his musical life. Luckily for us he appears to be ignoring the beast and continuing on his sonic journey through acoustic Americana, nodding at the likes of Mississippi John Hurt, John Fahey and Leo Kottke along the way. Using a few different guitars and a single Neumann M49 microphone he works his way through various genres, bending them and twisting them out of shape and into his own personal sound. There’s ragtime (J.R. Lockely’s Dilemma), some jaunty blues (The Altar at Center Raven) and a whole lot of bewilderingly intricate fingerpicking that will have you doubting what you’re hearing.